War of Attrition
by ezpzlemon
Summary: Time might be the greatest enemy Madara's ever faced. (Hashimada)


It's alive.

The tree shoots out from the ground the moment he pats the soil above the buried seed, immediately overtaking him in height and flinging branches out wildly in all directions. Madara takes a small relief in that; he's not sure he could've survived the wait if it grew like a normal tree.

As the trunk swells out from its core, an abnormal mass begins to protrude from one side. The wood distends slowly, at peace with its own pace, unhurried by the rapid growth testing the limits of the cave. As it pushes out of the tree, it takes on a life of its own; the man doesn't appear so much as he's converged upon by a million tiny evolutions, seemingly thoughtless but moved by a supernatural purpose. It's steady, and it's calm, and it's so like _him_ that Madara doesn't need to watch to know what comes next.

But watch he does. Shoulders sprout from its stubby chest, arms not far behind. The crowning bulge rounds into an eyeless skull, tethered to the trunk by the ropy chunks of its hair. And then, with a telltale groan of wood, eight splintery hands burst out of the tree, reaching for the air as if their breath could save them.

Madara's not sure what he expected, cultivating this flesh through the Gedo Mazo. A goopy, organic mess, perhaps.

But this...

The youngness is what really unnerves him—the first inkling of how what he's doing is wrong. Its face builds and builds till the resemblance is unmistakable, and when the final, tar-like beads of pulp fill out its hollow cheeks, it becomes evident how deep this betrayal truly goes.

But Madara knows there's no going back. The world won't change if left to its own devices; he simply cannot trust the future.

And as he watches it all unfold, the bud rising triumphantly from its peduncular spire, he finds that Hashirama still holds fresh as ever in his mind. Immutable, the sight and sound, the easy smile and heart-stopping frown, too charismatic for his own good. The memory is like a torch to tinder, and in the flames, a passing glimpse—

He realizes that Izuna died for nothing: his death did not keep him from joining Hashirama, and his eyes did not make it possible to defeat him. The Rinnegan doesn't require the Eternal Mangekyō, either, or any form of Sharingan at all. All that's ever mattered was him and the Senju, his brother and the rest left to waddle toward their demise.

(How would it feel, to explain everything to him—Izanagi, the Zetsu, the Moon-Eye Plan—just to see Hashirama marvel at it? To bask once again in his intrigue?)

The tree stops growing.

Silence creeps back through the barren tunnels—useless leaves hang limp on their branches, drained white as their roots in the dark—Madara sees the years stretch onwards past any reckoning of the sun or moon, past the taste of rain upon the earth and shimmer of wind over fields of grain. It occurs to him that in this lifetime, he will never again leave the cave. The Gedo Mazo like a ball and chain at his side, Madara looks back to the man in the tree; thousands of miles away, his brother's empty sockets stare blankly at a casket lid.

Hush, Izuna. This is my dream. In my dream, you are happy.

In my dream, you are

...

Happiness is a tree root, a boyish grin, a brother who throws his shuriken well, wide laughter. It's a tree root snapping at his heels, adrenaline racing, muscles bursting at the seams, fists connecting. It's Hashirama's slow panting and the solid planes of his body, the sage chakra thick and heavy on the air, charged with an unspoken potential. It's the sheen of sweat caught on his brow, all turned golden in the last light of day, and the moment his watchful eyes melt with the shade of coming twilight.

In Infinite Tsukiyomi, he will be fighting Hashirama, protecting Izuna, forever. Tobirama will be the one ousted, turned upon, and stabbed in the back. Hashirama will give up everything for him, will burn down Konoha with him, and they'll make love on their battlegrounds, on the corpses of their enemies. His clan will revere him, fear him, and follow him anywhere. The world will cower before the Uchiha, and peace will be his vengeance.

Those small meetings at the river—those dreaming days—they are not forever. They are little wisps of nothing being scattered on a breeze, to escape the ruin of the Earth.

In my dream, you

...

It's these moments that are the worst because there's nothing for him to do or work towards doing. Forever watching for the gears to click and pull the Plan further down the line.

He'd sleep, but his dreams would feel like betrayal more than the concessions made at each staggered step toward eternity, slowly edging the impenetrable front of time.

In my dream,

...

The Plan is to end the ninja cycle that twists love and murder into the same element, humans like cattle before every careless swing of its knife. He remembers being young, rocking his youngest brother to sleep in his arms, thinking everything could be alright. He remembers thinking that Konoha could fix the world, could make the pain go away, dispel his torment, pacify his restlessness—make all the hurt worth it. Madara can't trust the future, not when he's been forsaken by everything he's ever had faith in.

In my

...

He drifts in and out of flashbacks, but every time he truly wakes, the past carries nothing into the present, and Madara has lost everything but himself.

Or maybe he's lost that, too. Who could ever know for sure, with so many layers of dream brushing past him? Blurring into nothing, just empty nothing.

In

...

In those moments, maybe it sees him. Just maybe, it dreams beyond reality and touches back to the Earth from whence it came. Feels the black scars burned on its face and the monuments of toppled Kings, great valleys scrawled across eons of conflict.

Maybe it sees a river. Maybe it sees two boys teetering on the cusp of Fate, balanced into an inexplicable friendship.

If it could see and think and feel, and if it knew the carnage Madara has wrought, would it hate him?

·

...

With the feeling of hopelessness innate to all nostalgia, Madara knows there's only one way back.


End file.
